Officials arrested 41-year-old Mark Staake and his 23-year-old nephew, Tanner Ruane, for what could have been a ghastly crime.

Both men are from New Mexico. Police believe the pair was on their way to the St. Albans-area to murder two people. Investigators believe the plot is connected to 45-year-old Dana Martin.

Staake recently was released from the same New Mexico prison as Martin. Police believe they became friends behind bars.

Martin is serving two life sentences in a New Mexico prison for the October 2000 rape and murder of then-15-year-old Barre teenager Deandra Fluorucci.

Court documents from that case said Martin took Fluorucci to his house where he tied her to a bed and suffocated her. Martin then strangled the girl in his car.

Martin originally denied any involvement in the case, but later led investigators to Fluorucci’s body. He confessed a week later.

South Burlington Police Chief Trevor Whipple was chief in Barre during the Martin case.

“It was remarkable in the fact that it was a very young woman who was the victim,” Whipple said. “Deandra was in high school at the time. It was very upsetting to the community.”

Investigators said Staake became friends with Martin while also in prison, and last week, Staake and Ruane headed to our area.

They met up with border officials in Highgate last Monday after getting lost. Police said they arrested Staake there for violating his probation for a burglary in New Mexico. Ruane was released.

Last Tuesday, troopers said they caught up with Ruane at a gas station in Rotterdam, N.Y. He told officers he and his uncle had come to Vermont to buy a car. Police learned Ruane was wanted in New Mexico for conspiracy to commit murder.

While searching Ruane’s car, officers said they recovered documents associated with the murder-for-hire plot including names of the intended victims, their family members and location.

Authorities are coordinating with their counterparts in New Mexico to bring Staake and Ruane back to New Mexico.

Police in Vermont, New Mexico and New York believe Martin may be involved in other disappearances across the country.

A Justice Department civil rights investigation has concluded that the Ferguson Police Department and the city's municipal court engaged in a "pattern and practice" of discrimination against African Americans, targeting them disproportionately for tr...